Lord Halifax tried to negotiate peace with the Nazis

Lord Halifax, Britain's Foreign Secretary at the outbreak of the Second World
War, secretly met with an Old Etonian who tried to broker a peace deal with
the Nazis, according to newly-declassified security files.

Adolf Hitler's planes turned back.Photo: PA

By Chris Hastings, Public Affairs Editor

2:09PM BST 30 Aug 2008

The files reveal that shortly after the outbreak of war Halifax helped with the travel arrangements of John Lonsdale Bryans, who believed he could bring down Hitler by making contact with prominent anti-Nazi Germans including Ulrich von Hassell, the former German ambassador in Rome.

Initially Lonsdale Bryans thought he could drum up support for an anti-Nazi coup in Germany. But he subsequently changed tactic and tried to contact Adolf Hitler in a bid to negotiate a peace.

The disclosure that the Foreign Secretary had such close links with someone trying to contact Hitler during wartime will reignite the debate about his own beliefs.

Halifax, who met Hitler in 1937, was criticised for being too close to the cause of appeasement. Shortly after Churchill took over as Prime Minister in 1940 he was moved from the Foreign Office to the British Embassy in Washington.

The documents reveal that Halifax met Lonsdale Bryans, personally helped with his travel arrangements and even accepted intelligence reports from him.

Related Articles

A letter in the files from the passport office to Captain WS Mars, dated January 9, 1940, states: "The permit granted on the 8th was given at the request of Mr CGS Stevenson, the Private Secretary to Lord Halifax, who telephoned to say that the Secretary of State wished that all possible facilities should be granted to Mr Bryans."

More details of Lord Halifax's involvement are contained in a internal note for the Ministry of Information dated October 19, 1945.

Its states: "Lonsdale Bryans met Lord Halifax on 25 August 1939. That he should travel to Europe to make contact with enemy groups opposed to Hitler. Lord Halifax is reputed to have said that Britain would not fight for Danzig and the [Polish] corridor and later to have minuted that he was impressed by the proposal."

Security officials stumbled upon the mission by accident when they arrested an associate of Lonsdale Bryans called Anderson who had letters from the old Etonian on his person.

A note connected with an interrogation of Anderson states: "The main point which seemed to emerge from the interrogation was that according to Anderson, Lonsdale Bryans was a personal friend of Lord Brocket and also claimed to be something in the nature of an unofficial envoy of Lord Halifax. He wished to see Hitler and with this in view had asked Anderson to get in touch with a certain Stahmer that Bryans would be vouched by a number of persons including those on the list."

On December 13, 1940, MI5 contacted Sir Alexander Codogan, the Permanent Under Secretary of State at the Foreign Office, to provide further details of the arrest and to disclose what the service had learned about Lonsdale Bryans from his associate.

The MI5 note states: "With reference to our conversation yesterday afternoon with regard to the case of John Lonsdale Bryans, I attach a copy of a letter which this individual wrote to the Director of the Schwartzhaupter Verlay, Leipzig, evidently offering to make a trip to Germany for the purpose of an audience with the Fuhrer.

"In writing this letter Bryans has of course been guilty of an offence under the Defence Regulations (DR4A) in the he has attempted to communicate with the enemy, but I certainly agree with your view that in the circumstances of the case the suggestion that we should request the Admiralty to intercept the Portuguese vessel on which Bryans is now travelling from Funchal to Lisbon is not practical."

Sir Alexander agrees that given the Foreign Office's involvement the idea of an arrest is out of the question. On 7th April 1941 he wrote: "Although there seems to be a good deal to be said for locking him up to prevent him airing his views to all and sundry, I understand that if this is done it will inevitably involve him bringing up the question of his contacts with the Foreign Office and the facilities offered to him to get into Italy.

"In the circumstances we feel that he might be left at large though of course be strictly watched."

The Foreign Office seems to have spent the rest of the war worried that Lonsdale Bryans will reveal the mission to the outside world.

One Foreign Office note from the period states: "Bryans is becoming desperately short of money and although no mischief has been done so far, I anticipate the possibility that he might try to sell his story the press. It occurs to me that it might be a good idea to warn Lonsdale Bryans as seriously and solemly as possible that he should not go on telling people of how he contacted the Germans."

An MI5 official notes on 1 March 1944: "Bryans story would make sensational reading in the Daily Mirror."

The Foreign Office provided its clearest explanation of events in a letter sent seven years after the end of the war, when the security services found out about plans by Lonsdale Bryans to write about his adventures.

In a letter dated 15 August, 1952, an official wrote: "The truth of the matter seems to be that Bryans managed, by importuning a number of influential people in the country, to get himself an interview with Lord Halifax and, by virtue of his Italian contacts, to arrange a meeting with von Hassell in Switzerland to discuss a possible revolution in Germany and peace terms. He brought back a paper which he gave to Sir Alexander Cadogan purporting to be set out von Hassell's views. His did this off his own bat and was never set on any mission by Lord Halifax or employed by HMG in any capacity whatsoever, though Lord Halifax did see him and though his journeys to Switzerland and Italy were facilitated on two occasions, but solely to the extent then necessary to enable anyone to travel."